I know, my goals in life are weird.
Anyway, I thought number 6 merited a post of its own, because it recently made me rant to anyone who’d listen.
6) People who return books (that they’ve purchased)
I don’t know how you see it, but to me a book is more a “service” than a “good.” Once it’s been read, it cannot be unread, which means you’ve taken what there is to take from it–especially when it’s an e-book, so there’s no actual tangible object with intrinsic value to be returned.
This means that unless:
- there is a case of false advertisement–ie. the summary says its about two flies meeting on a sunflower and having crazy sex, but they really only say hi before a gardener sprays them to death
- the writing is bad–and I don’t mean not to your taste. I’m talking about bad grammar, random capitalization, typos, syntax that makes no sense, etc. All in all, something wrong with the writing
and/or
- the book is somehow damaged on purchase–in the case of a paperback or hardback,
you should not get to give it back for a refund. You should also be slapped if you do so without a review explaining why you’re giving it back.
My point is, if you buy a book marked as erotica and find the sex scenes too descriptive, you shouldn’t (get to) return it.
If you buy a book called Cooking Meat and are disturbed by the notion of poor cows being turned into burgers, you shouldn’t (get to) return it.
If you buy a–correctly tagged, edited, and proofread–novella that can be read within a couple hours and return the bloody thing three hours later, you are a cheapskate and should feel bad.
/rant
Me.
Can't argue with that. I hate seeing returns. Part of me is paranoid that at least some of them are copying it to pirate it around. I don't think e-book returns should be accepted unless there's something wrong with the file.
Now obviously, if someone stole your credit card and racked up $1000 of books, you should be refunded for the theft/fraud, but this is outside the norm.
Amazon says they crack down on people that abuse the return system, but really, how are they going to keep the perp from making a new account and still doing it? Those committed to getting something for nothing will go to great lengths to keep stealing.
The ones that boggled me were returns of 99cent books. Really? They needed the dollar back that bad?
I don't even mind the pirating possibility. I mind the thinking they “beat the system” by returning a bloody book. Go to a lending library!
The 99c books are the worst. Gah!